The objectives of this investigator were as follows: (1) To determine the degree of classroom application by elementary school teachers of the components of a research-based model of spelling instruction. (2) To determine the degree to which elementary school teachers held views that were congruent with the components of a research-based model of spelling instruction. (3) To investigate whether or not a statistically significant difference in teachers' practices and knowledge, as measured by a calculated discrepancy score, was attributable to groups categorized by grade level, professional experience, and professional training for three categories of behavioral items on the research questionnaire (Curriculum, Teaching Process, and Learner Strategies). / The data were obtained through the administration of an investigator-developed questionnaire. The twenty instructional techniques listed on the questionnaire were synthesized from 144 empirical studies. One-way analysis of variance was used to test the three research hypotheses. Further analyses of significant differences were conducted using the Scheffe procedure. An item analysis was used to determine the degree of discrepancy between teachers' classroom practices and their knowledge of research-based spelling instructional procedures. / The findings were that of the twenty pedagogical techniques, eight were reported as being used and favored by elementary teachers; one technique was reported as being used but not favored. In addition, teachers indicated a research-based view of six techniques, but failed to put their views into their classroom practices. Finally, teachers revealed classroom practices and professional views that were in conflict with five research-based techniques. The results from the one-way analysis of variance revealed that the discrepancies between teacher practices and teacher views were not affected by grade level, professional experience, or professional training. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 47-08, Section: A, page: 2873. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1986.

This study addresses the element which cognitive moral development researchers have tended to ignore, the perception of alternative courses of action open in any given moral decision-making situation. Specifically, the dissertation is concerned with exploring: (1) The relationship between the creative ability to perceive alternative courses of action in a decision-making situation with stages of cognitive moral development as defined by Lawrence Kohlberg and James R. Rest; (2) The amount of variance in generating alternative responses to such social/moral decision-making situations which can be explained by a combination of selected general knowledge, social knowledge, and demographic variables; and (3) Whether systematic training in generating alternatives to social/moral decision-making situations increases students' ability to generate alternatives in previously unencountered social/moral decision-making situations. / In real-world decision-making there are two relevant phases. First, there is the problem situation to which the actor or actors must respond by making a moral decision. Second, there is the actual laying out of feasible alternatives open to the actor or actors in that situation. / By logical analysis and a review of the literature on creativity, several critical factors emerge which affect a decision-maker's ability to generate increasing numbers of feasible alternative courses of action: general knowledge, spontaneous flexibility, social/situational knowledge, and practice in applying the rules of the decision-making model. / In this study, freshmen and sophomores at Palm Beach Junior College (Florida) were involved in college social science instruction, and those included in the treatment group were also provided systematic practice in generating alternative courses of action in decision-making situations. The research in this dissertation was designed to test this conceptual model, as the causal features of the ability or inability to generate alternatives in specific problem situations. / In light of the findings in this study, it appears that systematic practice does improve the ability of most subjects to produce a wider range of feasible solutions in real-life decision-making situations. Accordingly, the implications of this finding might be important for educators at all levels and in all academic disciplines. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 47-08, Section: A, page: 2876. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1986.

This experimental study examined the effects of two learning strategies, visualization and verbalization, on retention of verbal information and defined concepts when these are learned from expository text. Fifty-four sixth grade students read and studied a social studies lesson concerning the Industrial Revolution. One group answered embedded questions by generating drawings, while a second group answered the same questions by writing short essays. A control group read the lesson with no embedded questions. No rules for drawing or writing were presented, but students did have the opportunity to ask questions about, and practice, their assigned strategy. During one class period, students studied the lesson using the assigned strategy and completed an immediate, multiple-choice test assessing their learning of facts and concepts. Nine days later the students took the same test again so that delayed retention could be measured. No significant effects of an imposed strategy on learning were found on any measures. Interesting differences, although not statistically significant, indicate the possibility that strategy use (either visual or verbal) may enhance the learning of defined concepts. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 47-12, Section: A, page: 4274. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1986.

Research Context. Often instructional designers developing training materials for business or the military are not content experts. Similarly, content experts often are neither familiar with nor interested in learning training theory and methods. At the start of a training development project, there may be no job/task descriptions sufficient for instructional staff to undertake instructional development. The common dilemma then is how to efficiently work with content experts to make a task analysis and create other specifications which will enable the instructional staff to begin drafting instructional material. / A Novel Technique for Front-End Analysis. This study implemented and evaluated a novel technique to streamline front-end analysis for design and development of self-instructional texts on job tasks. The first stage of the technique involves one or more content experts completing a "large-grained analysis" of a topic, using a multiple-item instrument titled the "Topic Analysis Worksheet" (TAW). The second stage involves a more detailed, "fine-grained" topic analysis by the instructional staff using the TAW and resources named by the content expert(s). The end result is a full set of instructional specifications for the topic. / The instructional writer(s) then transmute the content into appropriate forms (e.g., graphics and text at an appropriate reading level) for placement in a prespecified standard lesson format. / The research involved a combination of descriptive information and quantitative data with specific, a priori criteria of success. The informative data were gathered by: (1) tracking tasks and times required to develop individual lessons plus related costs and materials consumed; (2) instructional design expert reviewing the completed lesson specifications; (3) content experts technically reviewing the lessons; (4) performance and attitude tests of learners; (5) structured interviews of project personnel, including the project instructional designer and writers to determine strengths of the technique as well as ways to improve it. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 48-02, Section: A, page: 0299. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1987.

During the past two decades, productivity levels in the U.S. have fallen and performance of workers has been affected by changing expectations toward work. The quality circle process has been used successfully to address problems of decreased productivity and worker dissatisfaction. An examination of the quality circle process revealed the decision making skills of participatory management. This study was designed to determine if those skills are included in Florida's vocational education curriculum and what skills industry would like to see added to the public school curricula. / Specifically, the study was designed to seek answers to the following questions concerning the decision making skills and techniques of participative management: (1) What skills are included in Florida's vocational curriculum? (2) What skills is industry requiring of workers? (3) What training is industry providing its workers in these skills? and (4) What skills would industry want public sector vocational education to provide in its curriculum? / Vocational Education Program Courses Standards and Industrial Education Career MAPs were reviewed to determine the skills of participatory management presently included in the curricula of Florida's vocational programs. The review revealed tasks supportive of participatory management skill development but specific reference to quality circle training was found in only two vocational program MAPs. / The population of the study included 38 organizations in Florida which had been identified as having implemented Quality-of-Work-Life programs following the quality circle philosophy. A questionnaire was mailed to "training directors" in these organizations to determine answers to Questions 2, 3, and 4 concerning a list of 25 skills which had been compiled through the literature review. / An analysis of data based on a return of 58% revealed consensus as follows: (a) more than 50% agreed that 16 of the 25 skills were required of employees; (b) more than 50% agreed that 21 of the skills are included in their employee training; (c) 60% or more agreed overwhelmingly on provision of training in these skills by public sector vocational education in Florida. / Recommendations were made to include participatory management training in the vocational education programs in Florida. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 47-12, Section: A, page: 4278. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1986.

This study determined whether military instructors would be less prone to alter systematically designed instructional procedures that had been changed to compensate for their stated needs and concerns than instructional procedures that had not been so altered. The secondary purpose of the study determined the instructional effectiveness of systematically designed instruction that was altered to compensate for instructor needs and concerns. / The study was conducted at the US Army Military Police School, Ft. McClellan, Alabama. An existing instructional module was revised using the military instructional design procedures. The revised instruction was termed the standard instruction. A focus interview was conducted with seven instructors to identify instructor needs and concerns regarding the instructional procedures contained in the standard instruction. Using instructor input obtained during the focus interview, changes were made to the instructional procedures and materials of the standard instruction. The revised standard instruction was termed the instructor-altered instruction. / To measure the amount of alteration the instructors would make in the instructional procedures, two alteration questionnaires were administered to the instructors; one for each version of the instruction. Sixty-five instructors completed the standard instruction questionnaire and 61 completed the instructor-altered instruction questionnaire. / T-test results for instructor responses on the alteration questionnaires were statistically significant. The hypothesis was supported, i.e., instructors would alter the instructor-altered instruction less than the standard instruction. / The instructional effectiveness of the instructional procedures was measured by administering a criterion referenced posttest after the instruction had been presented. A total of nine groups of students (n = 657) were administered the posttest. Of these nine groups of students, five groups (n = 309) received the standard instruction and four groups (n = 348) received the instructor-altered instruction. / Results of a ANCOVA revealed no difference in student performance for the two versions of the instruction. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 47-12, Section: A, page: 4278. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1986.

This dissertation is intended as a contribution to reading theory. It attempts to provide a linguistic and psychological answer to the following question: "On what basis do readers infer meaning from context?" / There are several problems with the present theories of reading. Not only are they characterized by a mistrust for the findings of the formal linguist (Smith, 1978, p. 78), but, apart from directing attention to the issue of inference, little attempt is made to characterize its basis or nature. A distinction ought to be made here between 'process models' and 'structural models'. A model of inference is proposed which attempts to reconcile the structural descriptions of linguistics with the process requirements of reading theory. / Chapters 1-3 present the theoretical background to the present model. This is a synthesis of the relevant fields, and is loosely divided according to subject: logic and linguistics (Chapter 1), psychology and verbal memory studies (Chapter 2), text and discourse analysis (Chapter 3). Each make the case for a model of verbal inference based upon situational entailments. / In presenting a new model there is a clear need for empirical validation. The quantitative section of this study describes an experiment involving 800 Haitian and Hispanic subjects. On the basis of our model, hypotheses are made for the distribution of their scores on the 'cloze procedure', a test instrument widely used for the assessment of reading. Texts were randomly selected from a public library and cloze procedures constructed by the arbitrary deletion of every twelfth word. For two of our hypotheses, the results strongly confirmed the predictions of our theoretical model (X('2) < .001). / The implications of these results are believed to be important. The concluding chapters (Chapters 6 and 7) present experimental conclusions and conjectures of general interest to reading theory, materials development and syllabus design. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 48-03, Section: A, page: 0553. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1987.

The relative importance of decoding skill and vocabulary knowledge to reading comprehension was investigated. Ninety-one fourth grade students from Hillsborough County Public School System were assessed on their decoding ability, vocabulary knowledge, and reading comprehension ability. Decoding ability was measured by (a) a 40-item Vocalization Latency Test (VL) utilizing a reaction-time apparatus; (b) a modified form of the Literary Assessment Battery Decoding Test (MLAB); and (c) the decoding section of the Wide Range Achievement Test (WRAT). Vocabulary knowledge was measured by the vocabulary score from the Comprehensive Test of Basic Skills (CTBS). Reading comprehension, the dependent variable, was measured by (a) a multiple choice Cloze #1 Test which contained high frequency words at a fourth grade level; and by (b) an altered multiple choice Cloze #2 Test which contained a portion (up to 10 percent) of low frequency (unfamiliar) words. Significant correlations were found among the variables of interest. / Comparisons were made among several of the correlations. It was found that (a) the correlation between decoding skill (MLAB) and Cloze #2 was significantly lower than the correlation between vocabulary (CTBS) and Cloze #2; and (b) the correlation between decoding skill (MLAB) and Cloze #1 was significantly higher than the correlation between the same measure of decoding (MLAB) and Cloze #2 ((alpha) = .01). / Multiple regression analyses yielded the findings that (a) decoding made a significant contribution to reading comprehension (high frequency words, Cloze #1) when vocabulary was controlled; (b) vocabulary made a significant contribution to reading comprehension (high frequency words, Cloze #1) when decoding was controlled; (c) decoding did not make a significant contribution to reading comprehension (low frequency words, Cloze #2) when vocabulary was controlled; and (d) vocabulary made a significant contribution to reading comprehension (low frequency words, Cloze #2) when decoding was controlled. / The results indicate that students depended on both decoding and vocabulary for reading comprehension in Cloze #1. In contrast, the students were more dependent on their vocabulary knowledge in the comprehension of Cloze #2. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 43-12, Section: A, page: 3802. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1982.

The effects of a learning module on transfer of training of a principle following spaced and varied practice of that principle were investigated using high school science students (N = 41). Treatment groups received spaced and varied practice, direct instruction for transfer (the transfer module) or both. Dependent measures were tests for near transfer. / The test score means for the combination of treatments was higher than for the spaced and varied practice group or for the transfer module group on the near and far transfer tests. The spaced and varied practice group scored higher on the two dependent measures than the transfer module group. The difference between the combination treatment group and the transfer module group was found statistically significant on the near transfer test. / Essential and supportive procedures used to improve the success and the breadth of the transfer performance were suggested. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 43-07, Section: A, page: 2227. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1982.

The study investigated the relationship between personality variables found in the Comrey Personality Scales (CPS) and other learner factors (foreign language aptitude, verbal intelligence, attitude and motivation) and success in the study of a second language. / Subjects were given the following tests: Comrey Personality Scales (CPS), Modern Language Aptitude Test (MLAT), Lorge-Thorndike Intelligence Test (LTIT), and Attitude Motivation Questionnaire (AMQ). Information was also used regarding major, second language studied, second language experience, and sex. / Stepwise multiple regression and other analyses were conducted using variables from the tests, Course Grade, and control variables sex, prior language experience, major, and language studied. / Results indicate a significant relationship among personality variables and second language success beyond the .05 level. A statistically significant (p < .01) model for predicting success in the study of a second language was established. / Personality was a rather weak predictor of success in the study of a second language when used alone. However, when personality was utilized in the predictor model with language aptitude, verbal intelligence, and attitude/motivation, its unique contributions were statistically significant. / The researcher believes that the results of this study provided insights into the relationship among personality and other learner variables associated with success in the study of a second language. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 43-12, Section: A, page: 3805. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1982.